The Once and Future King
by LinesAcrossThePage
Summary: Merlin has waited a long time for the return of Arthur Pendragon, something he isn't even sure is going to happen at all. But when Merlin meets a professor who has an interest in the language of the Old Religion, he hopes that his luck will soon change.
1. Chapter 1

_Ok so this is my first Merlin fic, I hope it's not too awful! This first chapter is basically backstory, setting you up for the time frame and the things that have happened up until that point. I hope you like it, I'll upload the next chapter soon!_

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It had been nearly two and a half millennia. He was exhausted; Merlin never thought waiting would be so difficult. And in the back of his mind, Merlin had always feared that he was waiting for nothing.

"The once and future king," He murmured to himself. He was absentmindedly washing the dishes from the brunch he had just eaten when his thoughts had drifted to Arthur as they often did.

After Arthur died, Merlin served Queen Guinevere until her passing, and then wandered off to live on his own for a very long time. Gwen's reign was a magnificent one. She accepted magic after discovering Merlin's true identity, and eventually the rest of the kingdom followed suit. The age of magic in Camelot was a glorious one; but when Guinevere died, she had no children to pass the kingdom to. As a result, the throne was passed onto Arthur's cousin, the son of Agravaine, Lord Damien de Bois. Like his father, he was a backhanded ruler, and cruel to his people. He hated magic, and it was immediately banished upon his crowning. It was at this time that Merlin left Camelot forever.

The years passed slowly while Merlin lived in recluse, and it wasn't until the Industrial Revolution that Merlin decided his life in hiding was becoming too difficult to keep up. At this point, he appeared to be quite old, and people couldn't just live in the wild anymore without being noticed. So he decided he would integrate himself into regular human life, settling down in Winchester, a city that had developed where Camelot had been only a few hundred years after its fall.

It was now the twentieth century, and the city of Winchester was now bigger than Merlin could have ever imagined. He quickly found that getting a job as a haggard old man wasn't very easy, and so he lived his life under an ageing spell that made him appear like a young adult once more. After working many years at multiple dead-end minimum wage jobs, he got hired as an archeologist's assistant in October of 2012.

The archeologist he worked for was named Allistor Carson. He was a former University of London professor who had left the classroom to pursue research of what he believed to be a lost human language. Merlin had been taking the train to London and sitting in on classes when he happened to stumble into a lecture the professor was having on the mysterious "language" he had discovered. Professor Carson had but a few pictures of the symbols engraved on a couple different medallions and one of the symbols carved in a slab of stone. Merlin recognized the strange symbols as the language of the old religion, and he couldn't get the images of the artifacts of his mind. It was the first touch of anything magic he had experienced in over two thousand years.

Merlin returned to the same classroom at the same time the next day, and after the lecture he approached Professor Carson about the mysterious language he was studying.

The professor was eager to share his story of stumbling upon the symbols to Merlin. He was living in New York and visiting England for archeological research in 1998 when he had his first encounter. He found a brass pendant during a dig on the Isle of Wight with the language engraved in a circular fashion around the edge. He thought nothing of it, as it looked like it could be decorative. However, when he found another medallion with the same type of symbols on a dig just south of Bournemouth a week later, his interests were peaked. He extended his trip another month, searching the south of England and some parts of Wales for similar artifacts. He got lucky two more times during his trip, both times in Winchester. After returning to the United States, his desire to continue researching the mysterious symbols consumed him. Allistor was well off financially due to a large inheritance he received as a young adult, so moving to the United Kingdom seemed like a fantastic idea. He had been concerned about forming connections, so he decided to apply to the University of London as an archeology professor. A few months later, he was moving into a flat in London and preparing to teach his first class. That was over ten years ago, and since then the trail had gone cold.

Merlin wished he had not been so out of touch with magic for so long. While he had been incredibly powerful when he was using his magic regularly, he had seldom used it over the long years he spent alone, and even when he did it was for the most mundane of tasks. His fluency with the language of the Old Religion had faded, and he could not interpret the symbols on the artifacts off the top of his head. Merlin wished he had Gaius to talk to, but Gaius had been killed during the rise of King Damien. But he knew he could be of some help to the professor. He knew geographically where the most sacred spots of the Old Religion had been, including the Isle of the Blessed. If he could convince the professor he could be of some use to him, he might be able to get a little closer to figuring out when and how the once and future king might return.

So Merlin lied. He told the professor he was a huge history buff studying to become a History teacher and he thought he recognized some of the symbols from the pictures the professor had. When the professor asked where from, Merlin said his grandfather used to have books about the Saxon invasions, and in them they spoke of a city called Camelot. These chapters included some pictures of these symbols. Merlin sadly told the professor that his grandfather had passed away a few years ago, and it was his grandfather's love of history that sparked Merlin's interest in it. Unfortunately, with the loss of his grandfather, the book Merlin spoke of became lost as well.

The professor didn't ask Merlin to be his assistant immediately, but eventually sent Merlin a letter asking him to start meeting him in the university library to do some research. The first couple weeks were slow, but eventually hints of Camelot and the magic surrounding that era began to pop up in books here or there. It wasn't long before the professor became so enthralled with Merlin's sudden appearance and the new clues they were finding that he quit his job to become fully invested in his research. Merlin of course knew that Allistor didn't notice or believe the bits about magic, but to him they were like little bits of treasured information; little hints about Arthur and his return. Merlin never told Allistor about the Old Religion, fearing he would think him mad. But they happily continued their research, both finding satisfaction from the bits of information they gained.

And so the two planned a trip. After months of research, they were to travel to Portsmouth in July of 2013 to begin a long adventure of looking for signs of the language of the Old Religion. They were both ecstatic, and the months of anticipation were nearly unbearable. Merlin was beyond ready to figure out how to find his once and future king.


	2. Chapter 2

Soft morning light streamed through the narrow windows of Allistor's flat. It illuminated the pages of the books that were carelessly scattered across the coffee table. The strong scent of coffee wafted through the mid-sized apartment. Both Allistor and Merlin sat on the couch, engrossed in a book they had found only two days ago.

The book was an English translation of a Latin text that was written approximately 1500 years ago. The translator believed that the text was a written copy of Celtic and Anglo-Saxon history that had been passed down verbally for generations. Because of this, many of the stories were ambiguous and convoluted. But in a few stories, the text spoke of the Saxons conquering a wandering people that they referred to as the "Drutes".

Allistor had hoped these people could possibly be the source of his mystery language. When Merlin found out about the Drutes, he could hardly contain himself. This could be a sign of the Druids, but he knew he could not tell Allistor of his knowledge of them.

Tomorrow they would embark on their journey. But today they were cramming in as much reading as possible.

"Oh," Allistor stood up, taking the book into his large, calloused hands. He looked elated and yet intrigued; his hazel eyes were bright with excitement. "Merlin, listen to this, 'the Saxons spent three days walking inland from the southern shore of Great Britain when they ran into a group of seemingly peaceful people. These were the Drutes, a race that the Saxons had defeated once before. The Drutes were angered when they discovered the Saxons' intent to conquer their land. They warned the Saxons that should they choose to take over the land and slaughter the Drutes as they did before, the wrath of the Drute gods would one day take vengeance, and a balance would return to the earth.'"

Allistor set the book back down on the coffee table and began to pace around his living room. His brows were furrowed in thought.

Merlin's hands rested firmly on his thighs. Ever since they found this book, he was in constant turmoil about whether to tell Allistor about the Druids or not.

"I think this settles it. We need to focus on the southern border on England. I know we were planning on starting in Plymouth, but that may be a mistake." Allistor rounded about the room twice more, than sat back down next to Merlin.

"Where do you suggest we start then? The south-eastern coast?" Merlin asked irritably. Allistor had already changed their plan three times in the last week, and it was starting to get tiresome.

Allistor's enthusiasm, however, was not thwarted, "That's exactly where I want to start! Since the Saxons' involvement with these Drutes started in the south, and the Saxons were coming from the east, I would think that starting there would be our best bet!"

Merlin let out an exasperated sigh. For someone who had already waited over two thousand years, he was growing entirely impatient. But Merlin forced a smile and nodded in agreement. "Well we should probably decide on a specific dig site then," He paused before deciding to add, "it's a good thing I haven't bought the train tickets yet."

Allistor waved off Merlin's snarky comment as he bounded off the couch. He happily treaded over to his laptop and pulled up a map of dig sites the two of them had been working on. "How about.. Framlingham castle?"

It was hard for Merlin to be mad at someone with such uncurbed eagerness. "That sounds fantastic."

That was the last change of plans they made. They packed up, and prepared themselves to find anything and everything. Of course, to Merlin, that was a whole different realm of possibilities. He hoped, at the very least, he would find out what happened to the Druids.

Merlin often wondered whether or not any people with magic other than himself survived to this day. Or if maybe there was a magical community, like the Druids. He knew, at least, if there were people with magic, they were well hidden or completely silent about their abilities. And if they were hiding, Merlin didn't blame them. His only living friend was a man who only knew one true thing about him: his name was Merlin.


End file.
